Friday, 10 February 2017

I remember taking this photo. I remember the feeling, our flat becoming home. I wrote about it. Belonging.I went back to London this week - I had to. Baby and me were going crazy; we had to get out. Out of the house, out of the town. It was wonderful - it felt like a great escape.I am always trying to outrun my inner-awkwardness: the bits of me that feel like they don't fit the way they should. The dreams that are preposterous. The tongue that is too sharp. The loves that are overwhelming. The intellect that gets bored and frustrated. The faith that is both fundamental and nebulous.Going to London this week felt like an escape, but it wasn't. It was life - part of my life. It was spontaneous and ambitious and I've been congratulated for the accomplishment, but I was just doing what was right for me. I had to go. It wasn't so much about being in a particular place. It was more about reclaiming a particular frame of mind.I want to be at home in my life. I don't know what I'm doing. I don't know what I'm trying to say. I just know that I need to keep this north star of authenticity. I need to keep allowing myself to be myself. I need to accept the things that make me different, the ways of being in / thinking about the world that are uncommon and isolating and special to me. It is so much easier said than done. There are so many comparisons that tug at me every day, decisions I second-guess and expectations I struggle to navigate. Especially now. In some ways, I feel like a teenager again - with peer pressure and body anxiety, relationships in flux and the future looming large.Maybe this is too much for the internet. Maybe all I've accomplished is wasting the time I should have spent sleeping - I will be up again before too long. But then again, maybe I'm not the only who feels they don't quite fit. And if that makes two of us, we can take heart - we belong after all.